I was wondering why there's no ZCASH ANN Thread here so I decided to launch one, the following info is copy + paste from http://z.cash:=====>

WHAT IS ZCASH?

Zcash offers total payment confidentiality, while still maintaining a decentralized network using a public blockchain. Unlike Bitcoin, Zcash transactions automatically hide the sender, recipient, and value of all transactions on the blockchain. Only those with the correct view key can see the contents. Users have complete control and can opt-in to provide others with their view key at their discretion.

Zcash transactions do not depend on the cooperation of other parties.

HOW DOES IT WORK?

Since the contents of Zcash transactions are encrypted and private, the system uses a novel cryptographic method to verify payments.

Zcash uses a zero-knowledge proof construction called a zk-SNARK, developed by our team of experienced cryptographers. These constructions allow the network to maintain a secure ledger of balances without disclosing the parties or amounts involved. Instead of publicly demonstrating spend-authority and transaction values, the transaction metadata is encrypted and zk-SNARKs are used to prove that nobody is cheating or stealing.

WHO IS BEHIND ZCASH?

All of the authors of the Zerocash protocol are on our team, which includes most of the creators of the Zerocoin protocol and leading researchers of zk-SNARKs themselves.

TECHNOLOGY

Zcash is a decentralized and open-source cryptocurrency that offers privacy and selective transparency of transactions. Zcash payments are published on a public blockchain, but the sender, recipient, and amount of a transaction remain private.

Zcash is based on peer-reviewed cryptographic research, and built by a security-specialized engineering team on an open source platform based on Bitcoin Core's battle-tested codebase. Our improvement over Bitcoin is the addition of privacy. Zcash uses advanced cryptographic techniques, namely zero-knowledge proofs, to guarantee the validity of transactions without revealing additional information about them.

Our zero-knowledge proving scheme makes it possible to conceal values and other identifying information from the public blockchain. Users simply prove that the values balance out and that they are not double-spending the amount they want to send.

The Zcash company aims to set a new standard for privacy through the use of groundbreaking cryptography.

In an open and programmable financial system, privacy is the only way to ensure fungibility and guarantee that cryptocurrency can be interchangeable as a fluid medium of exchange for users. Companies need the protection of privacy along their supply chain in order to conduct their business, especially in the context of public blockchains. In addition, we believe that personal privacy is necessary for core human values like dignity, intimacy, and morality.

We are a science-driven team. Our scientists and engineers are the discoverers of the underlying scientific principles and the designers of the protocol; we are not the controllers or the power-holders, and do not control the mining or distribution of Zcash. Every user of Zcash contributes to its decentralization, helping to protect it against failure and corruption. Our team is one among many participants in the network. We created Zcash, but its ultimate destiny lies not in our hands, but in yours.

JOIN US!

Need help? Want more details? Have ideas? We are an inclusive and growing community. Come on in!

I don't think there's a windows version yet, but it runs fine on linux.

Be aware that this is a a very slow "test-only" cpu miner, so once a public GPU miner will be available, hashing will be much faster.

There is no ICO.

The coin has not launched yet, it will or should launch around 28.th of October, there's testnet currently where miners, pools, transactions etc. are tested.

Mining is done with a new algo called "Equihash" - it's not compatible with any ASIC, it's currently mineable by CPU and GPU - there are no public miners yet. However there is a big open source miner contest here: http://zcashminers.org/ - you can earn up to $30k if you publish your miner.The Algo is very slow, about 0.7-1 soltutions (hashes) per second. (Yes, you read that right). I'll be mining it for sure

The technology looks interesting and promising, there seems to be a big dev team behind it, it's good to see things are finally getting real.

Twitter is full with messages about zcash, so it seems to catch attention pretty well, astonished me even more that there's no ANN here.

I've played around with it a lot and hope to have a full functioning pool up at launch, chances that everything works out and I'll be ready are looking pretty good right now, stay tuned and get yourself informed about the coin.

I'll update this post once I get more information about miners, pools the exact launch dates, issues and so on...

Who designed or created zcash? roger ver? Why the founder didn't come here to make official ANN?

Technically, it's a challenge to have fungibility in a shared blockchain, yet money requires fungibility. It's exciting to see the Zcash team working toward adding real fungibility to blockchains and with the strength and talent of this team, this is only the tip of the iceberg. - Dan Morehead | Zcash Investor

Privacy is a very important challenge with current blockchain technology, but existing solutions like private blockchains do not really solve the problem. The technology behind Zcash does. - Bo Shen | Zcash Investor

Zcash is strongest where Bitcoin is weakest; It gives users the easy ability to maintain their financial privacy. If anything can compete with Bitcoin, it will be on this front. - Roger Ver | Zcash Investor

On a more serious note though BCT is for scum coins serious coins get their own forums and move away from here.

Zcash is on another level entirely they simply don't need worthless posts or killerjoegreece asking them if they need greek translation. they've had their own forum from the jump, and useful people(coders, miners, serious investors) are already there.

in short, they couldn't give a shit about bct. lol does etherum even have a bct ann page ?

On a more serious note though BCT is for scum coins serious coins get their own forums and move away from here.

Zcash is on another level entirely they simply don't need worthless posts or killerjoegreece asking them if they need greek translation. they've had their own forum from the jump, and useful people(coders, miners, serious investors) are already there.

in short, they couldn't give a shit about bct. lol does etherum even have a bct ann page ?

Lol in fact I have allready contacted them and we will surely work something out

On a more serious note though BCT is for scum coins serious coins get their own forums and move away from here.

Zcash is on another level entirely they simply don't need worthless posts or killerjoegreece asking them if they need greek translation. they've had their own forum from the jump, and useful people(coders, miners, serious investors) are already there.

in short, they couldn't give a shit about bct. lol does etherum even have a bct ann page ?

Lol in fact I have allready contacted them and we will surely work something out

Lol you're a hard worker.can't knock your hustle. but it is getting very annoying though.